Well I went to past the code back in and noticed an extra set of these "{}" i took those out pasted the codes back in and hooray it works when i turn it on i can control the led with the potentiometer, then i push the button and it auto cycles then i can change it back but i have to push the reset button... Thanks for all of the help!!

and it auto cycles then i can change it back but i have to push the reset button...

This means that you are not reading the button state in the function that loops. You can either read the button state in that function, or stop the looping. Since the function will be called again when the loop() function is called again, this is probably the better approach. But, only you can decide which is appropriate for you.

you mentioned that i could make loop1(), and loop()2 read the button state to make them switch back and forth without pushing the reset button.. what would i need to put in those loops to make them read the button state??

EDIT: I just noticed something kind of interesting...if i replace loop2() with anything else i can switch between them just fine(i tested this by replaceing the code in loop2() with the code that is in loop1() but i changed the potpin to have a different input, and when i did that i was able to push the button and control color with one pot and when i pushed the button again it was controlled with a photoresistor). so apparently there is aproblem somewhere some how with the code for the color cycle i just have no clue where to even start looking

no i dont think i have held it down that longEDIT: i just held it down for that long and it still didnt chang back... is this going to be easier to just push the reset button or is there something fairly simple that can be done

Since you "need" to use delay, you will probable need to look into using an interrupt to monitor the switch. When the interrupt occurs, simply increment buttonPressCounter and set a global boolean variable (stop) to true. In fadeUp and fadeDown, change the conditional part of the loop to include " && !stop":